The growth and increasing sophistication of mobile devices is changing the dynamics of computing and Internet usage. Previously, the spread of mobile computing was hampered by the limited functionality and lack of network connectivity of early mobile devices. Early mobile phones could do little more than place telephone calls and were thus not thought of as computing devices. Although personal digital assistants (PDAs) did provide some advanced computing functionality, they typically did not include any means of wireless communication and needed to be paired with a desktop or laptop personal computer to transfer data or applications. Similarly, early tablet devices were designed with the rudimentary goal of replicating the desktop experience in a compact form factor and did not introduce a new model of computing. Thus, the computing experience was defined by the desktop operating system, wherein users installed applications from a variety of disparate sources and accessed online content almost exclusively through a web browser.
However, mobile platforms such as iOS™ by Apple and the Android™ operating system by Google have redefined the computing experience by introducing new models for providing functionality and delivering content to end users. By taking advantage of persistent or readily available Internet connections on mobile devices, mobile platforms provide a central repository through which end-users may download applications. Users can access an online application store or marketplace and browse a catalog of thousands of applications performing a variety of different functions. The applications may be categorized by genre, popularity, recency, or other attribute. With a few clicks, a user can download any application in the catalog through the same familiar interface. Providing a unified application distribution channel has enabled platform owners such as Apple and Google to streamline and simplify the application development process. Third party application developers are either required or strongly recommended to follow certain guidelines in designing their applications, which are packaged in a standardized manner as lightweight bundles for distribution through the application store or marketplace. This streamlined, efficient model of application delivery has had a profound impact on personal computing and has spread to desktop and laptop platforms. For example, in the 10.6.6 release of its OS X™ operating system, Apple introduced the Mac App Store™ for applications designed to run on Macintosh™ desktop and laptop personal computers.
In addition to introducing innovations in application delivery, mobile phones and tablet devices running mobile operating systems account for an increasing proportion of global Internet traffic and have enabled Internet users to access content in new and unique ways. Mobile phones and tablet devices with advanced features and Internet connectivity are becoming increasingly common, to the extent that Internet access itself is becoming ubiquitous. In addition, instead of providing access to content exclusively through a web browser, many mobile platforms provide applications that are custom-tailored to download and display content from a particular source. These applications may be developed by third parties and provided to end users through the platform's application store or marketplace. An application designed to deliver the content of a particular online portal or service may provide functionality analogous to that of the portal or service's website. For example, the Yahoo! Finance application for iOS provides access to the same content available through the Yahoo! Finance website, but in a manner that is custom tailored for iOS devices and takes advantage of the unique features of the platform and hardware. Thus, the users of such devices may access their favorite content portals through portal-specific applications instead of a web browser.
This new paradigm of mobile computing has important implications for targeted advertising. Existing techniques for delivering targeted advertising to Internet users are designed primarily for desktop platforms, on which online advertising is delivered via the web. On desktop platforms, the overwhelming majority of information used to target an advertisement to a user is gathered from the user's web browsing history. This is because a user's web browser is the principal tool by which the user accesses the Internet on a desktop or a laptop. However, as noted above, on a mobile device a greater proportion of the online content viewed by a user may be delivered via the applications a user has downloaded, and advertisements may be presented to the user within an application. In addition, unlike desktop platforms, the unified distribution channel for applications on mobile platforms imposes a higher degree of standardization on third party application developers, giving more control over the platform to the platform owner and allowing the tracking of information such as the applications a user has installed and their usage patterns.
Consequently, there is a need for a technique for utilizing information about the applications a user has installed on his device in targeting online advertising to the user. As will be demonstrated, the embodiments disclosed herein provide such a technique in an elegant manner.